As the tsunami hit her school in
Sendai, kindergarten teacher Junko Kamada stood in the window of
a second story hall to block the children from seeing the
destruction caused by the 1.5-meter wave.

Amid dirt-caked chairs, soiled books and damaged equipment,
Kamada, 60, is preparing to bring the students back to the
school, about a mile inland from the coast. The children will
also need counseling to deal with the trauma they have
experienced, psychologists say.

Schools resumed two days ago in northeastern Japan, the
epicenter of the March 11 magnitude-9 earthquake. Classes --some
held in homes and makeshift spaces -- are providing a safe place
for children to reunite with friends and a semblance of
familiarity amid the nation’s worst disaster since World War II.

While adolescents attuned to the
reality of death may act out their trauma, younger ones find it
harder to articulate their distress, she said.

People who suffer psychological ailments such as depression
in childhood are 10 to 20 times more likely than others to
experience those problems in adulthood, according to a 2010
study in the journal Social Science & Medicine. Affected
individuals tend to leave school earlier and earn about 20
percent less over their lifetime, the authors found.

“When children suffer from an acute fear, they tend to
depend on their mothers more for their safety, and display
regressive and immature behavior,” said Naotaka Shinfuku,
professor of psychiatry at Seinan Gakuin University in Fukuoka,
who studied the impact of the 1995 earthquake in the Japanese
city of Kobe. “It’s good for children’s mental health to learn
and play in a safe environment if they wish to do so.”